The present disclosure relates to the field of three-dimensional virtual environments, and, more particularly, to voxel based three dimensional (3D) virtual environments.
In computing environments, virtual entities (avatars, for example) are often moved about a three dimensional virtual environment, where the virtual entities are controlled by users and/or by computer based intelligence. Semi-automated forces (SAF) are one implementation specific (and non-limiting) example of an application functioning within a three dimensional virtual environment. More specifically, SAF are computer-generated forces (CGF) that react in a manner similar to real forces using computer models that determine decision making aspects of the simulated force entities. That is, the simulated force entities are programmed with the doctrine and behavior associated with a corresponding real-world entity being simulated, so that during an exercise, they move and react in a realistic manner over a simulation space. The simulation space can be a geo-specific synthetic environment of a battlefield, generated from digital mapping data.
SAF applications and components require highly complex terrain representations (e.g., Synthetic Natural Environments (SNE) or Terrain Database (TDB)) in order to operate. Producing these SNEs and/or terrain databases is labor and cost intensive. Prior approaches build SAF environments from digital mapping data. The digital mapping data is usually a combination of Digital Elevation Model (DEM) data and a set of vector layers, such as road centerlines, water areas, and building footprints. In some cases, the vector data can be aligned to terrain imagery or can be extracted from imagery through semi-automated means. The vector data, imagery data, and DEM data are obtained from different sources and are collected at different times. Moreover, DEMs and vector layers can require months to years to create from raw earth measurements making it difficult (if not impossible using current techniques) to build SAF compatible SNEs from current geospatial data.